Strange Culture

It all starts with a real event, the arrest and then continuous harassment of Steve Kurtz from 2004 until 2008 for the sole reason that he used biological material as a kind of art form. The story, truly incredible, yet totally real, needs to be heard. It shows how, under the right motivation, the FBI can do almost anything to someone for no reason at all.

The film, however, is made almost like a conspiracy theory flick, one of those artsy, liberal, intellectual in your face things that don't gather the normal crowd of people because they are simply weird for a common person. You see a long haired university professor that works with bacteria as an art form in order to promote awareness of genetically modification in the foods marketed in the US. He is ridiculous! However, what happens to him (and his friends) is completely real.

Now, I think this story could have been told a lot better and it should have been because it is one of those tales that show how close a proud democracy can turn overnight into a dictatorship or a police state. There is one line in the film where Steve Kurtz says that if the legal precedent would have succeeded, the power of the Department of Justice would have doubled overnight, by simply allowing them to turn any civil misdemeanor into a criminal issue.

Bottom line: whether you will watch this film or not, Steve Kurtz is a man you should at least read about, get your facts straight, see how it could all have gone wrong for all of us if he (and perhaps a lot of people in his situation) would have caved in to the pressure.

It was President Roosevelt that told us, "The only thing you have to fear is fear itself." The Bush administration has put the country into a constant state of fear since 9/11, and the result is that we have been complicit in the removal of the very freedoms that make us unique in the world.

Benjamin Franklin said, "Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety." The Bush administration is counting on the fear and ignorance of the American people to continue to allow them to build their tyranny in the guise of safety.

This is the story of how the government uses their tyranny to come down on those with whom they disagree. As stated so eloquently in the film, they no longer use the civil process, they have turned civil litigation into criminal litigation. They have also passed laws allowing them to lock up any of us at will.

This is a story of how an artist, Steve Kurtz, is persecuted by the government for daring to oppose the multi-national corporations that finance these sleazy politicians; but it is really the story of what could happen to every single one of us if we continue to sit in front of the TV and watch trash and let the government do what they will.

This film is a must see if you care or about the arts in the current political climate, or for that matter if you care about civil liberties in general.

Strange Culture is very different from Lynn Hershman's other work--a unique documentary/narrative hybrid. An amazing and surreal performance by Thomas Jay Ryan. Though there is an amazing cast, the real star is Steve Kurtz, the Buffalo artist who is the subject of the film. Steve's heartbreaking retelling of his wife's death, and his subsequent arrest and legal wranglings is must see for anyone who believes are government is beyond reproach.

This film is powerful, heart wrenching, and an outrageous indictment of the current state of political affairs.

i was blown away by this movie. It is nothing you would expect. It creeps up on you. It is a truly important film, and extremely timely. The footage is remarkable and varied. It is as if the film turns itself inside out so that you are right there, inside the movie, sitting right next to the actors, who are sharing intimate moments of themselves, candidly and without guile. The identity device is brilliant, and took me by surprise, even though there were clues along the way. The way the various elements were handled, from the comic strips to re enactments to interviews were skillful and well crafted. This is one of the the films that can make a difference because it brings an awareness of the repercussions of policies to a human level. I highly recommend this film.

I came to this because its folded. It is consists of some unsophisticated notions about "them" corrupting food, some art about it, deliberately folded into the artifacts, a documentary about the making of that art, a profile of the artist, outside the documentary, a story of how "they" interpret the art as a murder plot and a documentary of that story.

And it has Tilda Swinton whose presence usually signals something profound.

But the film is too clumsy to do its work. You can roughly get the facts.

Its another case of an event that becomes caught up in forces no one controls... that finds its way into film by way of combat with similar forces. Those forces come from story threads, conventions, urges that this filmmaker is as helpless to control as the protagonist.

There's one interesting idea here. The character played by Tilda is the artist's wife, Hope. She is the genius of an art collaborative, who is not an artist herself in the sense of creating. She is the "explainer," who makes the collaborative work by providing the story hooks into what these guys do.

The story is triggered by her death. The authorities arrive and without her storyweaving ability, put together their own conspiracy about a conspiracy. This film could have used her.

This film could have been "The Lives of Others," with the Bush FBI in place of the Stasi.

Still, even if the film fails it is far, far more powerful a message than Moore could put together.

Ted's Evaluation -- 2 of 3: Has some interesting elements.